A look at Boston Ballet as it celebrates its fiftieth anniversary by Geoff Edgers in The Boston Globe.

These days, Boston Ballet runs its own box office, has been earning record revenue, and has revamped “The Nutcracker,” its biggest production, to popular acclaim. Through increased fund-raising, the company has also wiped out an accumulated debt and brought in $3 million for an emergency fund. It is now the fourth largest ballet company in the United States, with a $31 million annual budget and the world’s largest ballet school.

He nods when I ask if he agrees with the views of the Bolshoi's new general manager Vladimir Urin that the Bolshoi suffers from "star disease". "Yes. The Bolshoi dancers were unnecessarily resistant to my ideas. They thought, he, Ratmansky, was not even accepted into the Bolshoi, how dare he come in and change things. But I was the choreographer. If you don't accept the director being authoritative, OK, but the choreographer has the right to say, I want it this way."

After seeing the company dance at two regional festivals, Balanchine liked what he had seen well enough to offer to coach Williams once a month in New York (the equivalent of Picasso giving someone monthly drawing lessons) and let her watch New York City Ballet classes and rehearsals. More important, he recommended the company for a $144,000 grant from the Ford Foundation in 1963. That seed money helped New England Civic Ballet become Boston Ballet.